Many types of aerospace vehicles include one or more control surfaces that project outwardly from a main body of the vehicle to enhance or to enable proper control of the vehicle. Typically, such control surfaces are designed to meet anticipated load requirements associated with control of the vehicle. Among the considerations involved in the design of such control surfaces is the stiffness of the control surface to avoid flutter. More specifically, to avoid flutter of a control surface (e.g. a control fin) it is typically necessary to increase the fundamental mode shape frequencies.
For example, FIGS. 1 and 2 show simplified cross-sectional views of control surface assemblies in accordance with the prior art. In FIG. 1, a control surface assembly 100 includes an outwardly-projecting control surface portion 102 coupled to a flat flange portion 104 that attaches to an aerospace vehicle 106 (e.g. a missile, an aircraft, etc.). Typically, the control surface assembly 100 is efficient in bending stiffness, but is relatively less efficient in providing torsional stiffness. In FIG. 2, a control surface assembly 200 includes a non-uniformly tapered outwardly-projecting control surface portion 202 coupled to a base portion 204 having a solid support member 205. The base portion 204 is coupled to a fuselage (or body) 206. The control surface assembly 200 is typically less efficient in bending stiffness than the control surface assembly 100 having the flat flange portion 104 however, the control surface assembly 200 may exhibit improved torsional stiffness over the control surface assembly 100 due to the stiffness of the solid support member 205.
Although desirable results have been achieved using the prior art control surface assemblies shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, there may be room for improvement. For example, for at least some applications, the prior art assemblies may exhibit undesirable weight and heat transfer characteristics. Therefore, improved control surface assemblies that at least partially mitigate these undesirable characteristics would have utility.